Rome: first impressions

Romans are very friendly and warm. The food is fantastic but expensive. Europians are, in general better looking than Americans. The weather is great and the city is beautiful. So far I'm not a fan of the major sites I've seen, they're all a little ruined by mobs of people with cameras and fanny packs. But I do love walking the alleys off the beaten path. Time for dinner and night life, I'll keep you posted!
Mike

So much for an early night and a morning run

After meeting some beer enthuisits, making it an early night was vetoed by a tour of Italys small but growing craft beer culture. Most of today has been filled with lectures. I've seen a couple good ones but am reminded about how bad engineers are at presenting information.

Rome, day 1

We've arrived in Rome! The trip was uneventful except when the lady next to me ordered her third glass of wine, and decided it would look great spilled all over my new pants. Rome is beautiful, I've covered a lot of the city walking (with some help from a couple shots of expresso). Our hotel is nice, a block away from the st Peter in chains church and just down the road from the collesum in a quiet alleyway. I'm pretty exausted and might make it an early night. I want to go on a mourning jog to some of the sites before they begin looking like Disney land again... Then it's conference time! The talks sound cool in the neardiest way possible, ours is on Tuesday!

Anyhow, I'll try to keep this updated but expect short posts because I'm tapping them out on my iPod.
Peace
mike

Does anybody know what's actually going on in Honduras? The UN, USA, and a few other large world players have denounced the coup, but I can't help but feel sympathy for the new regime. first off, they obviously have enough support from the people to overthrow the government. Oppression isn't anything new in Honduras, one of the leading banana exporters of the world. I know that US companies like Chiquita and Doll have major stakes in the Honduran economy, and in past coups have supported the old government to get stability back as quick as possible (coups are not good for business). There's also been a lot of press on these companies mistreatment of their workers. Ties to drug cartels have been linked to the old leader, and I wonder if the US is supporting him because we believe in democracy or if we stand to loose a lot of money due to fair rites for the country and their workers?

Sorry i havn't been posting very much. I've been busy with school and bike riding. the triple is 2 weekends from now! I'm feeling strong, and overall pretty confident about the ride. thats all for now. peace.
-mike

Lunch time musings

How often it seems we take some blessing God has given to us out of his goodness and turn it into some sort of pat on the back for ourselves?

its like saying "surely because I've got this blessing, I've done something right and God is rewarding, and those that don't have it must have done something wrong, and are being punished"

I seem to see this attitude in myself and my friends all the time. Some examples are:

• Our friends (community)
• Our health/athleticism
• The place we live, earths beauty
  
• Our possessions
  

It seems that this posture seems to reflect our worship for ourselves, and our constant feeble attempts to cover our sinful nature with our good acts. How much more an act of worship to realize how little we deserve any of our blessings, but are given them in abundance anyways?\

I guess this is important because it determines the way we use our blessings. If we assume our wealth is a blessing to us, without our earning, than we will be more likely to use it to bless others. on a less noticeable note, if we assume we are in great community because we have done something right, our community will soon turn inwardly focused and will not represent the outwardly focused church in the new testament.

My first You-Tube video

I started making this one day when i checked the weather and saw a stunning mid-latitude cyclone over much of the US. I wrote a little script to grab the current viable water vapor image off the net, and stitch them together in a video.

These large scale vortices are common around the globe, and match (in structure) a lot of the smaller scale vortices I study in the lab.

2009 Big Bike Trip

Last year we road the blue ridge parkway to fulfill my nastolgia for Appalachia. We had a great time on a perfect trip that can will never be re-created.

However, my love riding my bike remains, and Today a dream was born for this summer: a trek through the beautiful Rockies from Boulder to Crested Butte, stopping along the way in destinations such as Estes Park, Winter Park, Frisco, and Buena Vista.


The trip will either happen in late June or early August. Here's links to maps of individual days:

Day 1: Boulder->Estes Park 64 miles, 6483 ft climbing, 3763 decent
http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/co/boulder/75712398313061540

Day 2: Estes Park->Winter Park 68 miles, 5630 ft climbing, 5052 decent
http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/co/-estes-park/561123983182788124

Day 3: Winter Park->Frisco 72 Miles, 2310 ft climbing, 2251 ft decent
http://www.mapmyrun.com/route/us/co/tabernash/982123983356526213

Day 4: Frisco->Buena Vista 68 Miles, 3310 ft climbing, 4396 decent
http://www.mapmyrun.com/route/us/co/boulder/225123983402330303

Day 5: Buena Vista->Crested Butte (This is up for debate, the route i have on the map above might be dirt roads...)

If any of my buds that are reading this want to join in, let me know!

Peace.
mike